District Rejects Contract

DIGEST

July 22, 1997|STAFF REPORTS

IT Corp. lost a potential $42.5 million contract on Monday to build two Everglades cleanup marshes because it failed to satisfy water managers' rules for doling out a portion of that work to minority- and women-led businesses.

The South Florida Water Management District said it would instead split the job between two companies, Harry Pepper and Associates and Bergeron Land Development, whose combined bids exceeded IT Corp's price by $300,000.

Harry Pepper and Associates offered to build one filter marsh west of West Palm Beach for $18.3 million. Bergeron Land Development offered to construct the other, across Brown's Farm in southwest Palm Beach County, for $24.5 million.

The district passed on the cost savings offered by IT Corp. because the company could not demonstrate that women and minority enterprises would receive at least 16 percent of the contract earnings, said district spokesman John Neuharth.